Pellegrini does not fear Barca

16 December 2013 04:31

Manchester City boss Manuel Pellegrini does not believe facing Barcelona is the fearsome prospect it once was.

City have been handed a testing tie against the Catalan giants in the last 16 of the Champions League.

Pellegrini's men might have avoided such a big clash had they not misunderstood the group stage goal difference rules last week.

City beat Bayern Munich 3-2 but Pellegrini failed to realise that victory by one more goal would have secured top spot in their group and a theoretically more favourable draw.

Yet simply after beating the European champions, and then scoring six past Barclays Premier League leaders Arsenal, Pellegrini is confident enough after the draw.

He said: "I think they will be very concerned also. Barcelona is not the team it was two years ago.

"I think it is a beautiful game with two very good teams."

While Pellegrini accepts he miscalculated in Munich, he insists his side would have faced a tough draw from whichever position they had finished in the group.

He said: "All the 16 teams that play in the last 16 are the best teams of Europe - so Real Madrid, Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Borussia Dortmund, Paris Saint-Germain for me was exactly the same."

Despite what happened in Munich - and Pellegrini's failure to send on top scorer Sergio Aguero continues to be picked out by critics - the Chilean insists his team did not stop trying to score a fourth.

He feels too much is being made of the matter and the team are not receiving enough credit for their achievement in recovering from 2-0 down.

He said: "There was no confusion. Maybe a mistake could be if I thought 3-2 was enough and we didn't try to score the fourth goal - but we tried to score the fourth and fifth goal but we couldn't do it.

"I respect the critics but I think they are absolutely confused against who we were playing."

Pellegrini believes City, who have qualified for the knockout phase for the first time, will take a lot from claiming such a notable scalp.

He said: "A lot of confidence. The most important thing, and we had already done it, was to qualify for the next round but to play against Bayern was a big test for what we can do in the future."

The tie will bring Barca star Lionel Messi up against his Argentina team-mate Aguero.

Pellegrini recently said he rates Aguero third, behind Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, among the world's best players.

But the Chilean said: "It is not only Messi and Aguero. The two teams have top players and we will see which play better in that round of Champions League.